Ada Ronald Thomas moved to Ross-on-Wye in 1997 as a single mum with two daughters.

The local author is a health care worker and for 10 years worked in the Middle East, but she really missed England and the Wye Valley. She told the Ross Gazette that she found that writing about the area while she was away helped her. Then after the birth of her first grandchild she set about writing a story, which her children and grandchildren would be able to read in the future, about a place in the world which meant a great deal to her.

She told the Ross Gazette: “I saw it as giving something of myself to my children.”

Ada has now written five books but her latest is the first of a trilogy set in the Wye Valley. It is about a community of teenagers centred around a Portugese smuggler the trilogies are linked through the illicit activities.

This historical adventure story is the first in a series of three set in the Wye Valley and at the time when Chepstow was a busy port.

This adventure begins when friends meet up in a Chepstow coffee house. They come up with a plan to earn some ready cash by smuggling.

Tom and Aaron were looking forward to meeting their friends at Missus Musty’s well-known coffee house in Chepstow on the last market day before Christmas. It was while they were all in there, enjoying her famous pies, that they chanced upon Rigo, a bold Brazilian sailor seeking his fortune, who thought smuggling might gain him some ready cash.

Ada Ronald Thomas, the author of ‘O Contrabandista’ The Smuggler, will be holding her first book launch at Stella & Rose’s Books, Tintern, on October 5th, 2019. The launch will begin at 2pm and the author will be selling and signing copies of her books for those in attendance.

O Contrabandista - The Smuggler is also available to purchase at Rossiters Books.